Nn Tenants Group Maintain Slow Pace

Newport News Redevelopment & Housing Authority commissioners expressed irritation Tuesday over the pace at which management responsibilities are being turned over to public housing tenants.

But in a sharp defense of the process, the head of the city's public housing tenants association told the board that the tenants group does not want to be rushed into entering an agreement the group is not ready for.

``We'd like you guys to just hold up a little bit and take your time with us,'' said Renee Walker, president of People Earning a Real Living (PEARL), the resident management group made up of tenant groups from the authority's 11 public housing projects.

Referring to the contracts under which tenants are expected to participate in managing their own projects, Walker said, ``A dual management contract is not some flimsy document. We want it to be inclusive of everything. We want to take our time to do it right.''

"No board of commissioners or anyone in the state of Virginia is going to rush us into doing that,'' she added.

Shifting toward resident management of public housing projects has been a key aspect of the ``tenant empowerment'' message pushed by U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Jack Kemp.

The issue was raised Tuesday by board member L. Joseph Connors, who has frequently criticized the pace at which PEARL has taken on management responsibility.

Connors wanted to know why the authority had failed to comply with a ``pledge'' reportedly made by a federal housing official in April that the authority and PEARL would enter into a dual management agreement within 90 days.

Contractor's Corner, a newsletter published by the Newport News Office of Human Affairs, which receives funding from the authority, had reported that David Caprara, HUD's director of Resident Initiatives made the pledge at a PEARL graduation ceremony.

But Housing Authority Executive Director William Hawkins said he recalled that Caprara had said ``he would like to see'' the authority and PEARL enter an agreement, not that he made a pledge.

The authority's attorney, Johnny C. Cope, said the agency is trying to work out separate contracts for different phases of management, under which PEARL could bid against private contractors to provide janitorial, groundskeeping or other services.

Moving to exert closer oversight over the movement toward dual management, the board also voted to reactivate a committee that had worked on an application for federal funding earlier this year. The committee will include board members Harry E. New and Harry N. Woessner.

Board member Ella B. Spratley said she wanted the board to receive monthly updates on progress toward signing the dual management agreement.

Also Tuesday, the authority's board rejected by a 4-3 vote a new policy that would require it to look much more closely at tax-exempt bond issues requests that developers bring before the agency.

Board Chairman Wyatt S. Mapp broke the tie by voting against the proposal. But Mapp predicted that the revised policy, proposed by Connors, would pass after it is reworked.

He said after the vote that he was in favor of the policy change in principle, but that he wanted to try to resolve the concerns of the three other board members who voted against it Tuesday: Spratley, Willie S. Thomas and Marvin A. Jackson. Connors, New and Woessner voted for the policy change.